Philips CEO: Simplify Digital Media Consumption

In essence, this is what Philips CEO Gerard Kleisterlee said in his speech at CES…he said the industry had developed dozens of exotic proprietary technologies to serve the needs of manufacturers, instead of consumers.

Kleisterlee also criticized those electronics and media companies which are scrambling to control the emerging online media market in which consumers will increasingly buy films and music over the Internet.

“Yes, we must protect the rights of intellectual property holders. But not at the cost of eliminating the rights of the consumer,” Kleisterlee said.

And hey, here’s a line he stole from me (ok, not really, but here’s what I spoke about in my Finland/Stanford speech [powepoint file] in November: “2004 is the year of business models…It is time for anthropologists to come out and start working on media consumption patterns”): “Overall, I think we need to employ more anthropologists and fewer technologists.” Read his speech transcript here.

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